Item — HN Reader

>It's already cheaper than anything else and getting even more cheaper.

Cheap but a lot of folk don't follow through. China accounted for some 50% of the coal capacity under construction in 20 countries last year. China (75%) dominates the solar business but opened more coal power plants last year than at any time in the last seven years. At the same time their solar accounted for only 3.5% total energy consumption.

'It's already cheaper than anything else'. Is this a prediction? If so when will it become a reality because at the moment it's the reverse of the truth for most locations.

https://www.reuters.com/world/india/india-scrambles-add-coal...

https://elements.visualcapitalist.com/chinas-dominance-solar...

1 comments

It's becoming a reality because it's true. China would deploy more solar but their factories are kind of maxed out producing panels and providing them to the rest of the world.

As for their coal plants. They have a bit of a debt bubble going on where there are lots of things being built that aren't needed (e.g. massive amounts of apartment blocks). These coal plants might get constructed. But turning them on and supplying them with coal is a different matter. Either way, most analysts seem to think that China's coal usage has already peaked. Peak coal usage for the whole world is in the past. Most US and European coal will be gone within 15-20 years. I don't think China will be that far behind.

India is a bit of an outlier. They have a massive population and rapid economic growth. So they have a big appetite for more power generation. Renewables can't keep up short term. But of course they are perfectly located for solar power generation being as close to the equator as they are.

It's not a question if they'll be using solar but how much GW per year they'll be deploying. I believe on a per year basis that's already outstripping their quite ambitious coal generation plans. They deployed 18GW of solar last year. China doubled it's deployment by a whopping 217GW last year. More than anyone else. India has a bit of catching up to do but it seems they are getting there.